I love the new draft rules, puts more emphasis on actually scouting the players and less emphasis on $$$. The "over slot" signings by the big spenders always bothered me, glad to see that gone.

I agree. They basically just solidified the chances that the system will work as intended all along. I would have liked to see them make it mandatory that international players enter the draft, like the NBA does, but this is progress IMO.

__________________"I have the ultimate respect for White Sox fans. They were as miserable as the Cubs and Red Sox fans ever were but always had the good decency to keep it to themselves. And when they finally won the World Series, they celebrated without annoying every other fan in the country." Jim Caple, ESPN (January 12, 2011)

"We have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the (bleeding) obvious is the first duty of intelligent men." — George Orwell

This will be pretty interesting. So does this in any way encourage/force someone like Kenny Williams to draft for talent and not necessarily signability? It seems like it would but maybe I'm misreading it. Any thoughts?

This will be pretty interesting. So does this in any way encourage/force someone like Kenny Williams to draft for talent and not necessarily signability? It seems like it would but maybe I'm misreading it. Any thoughts?

This will be pretty interesting. So does this in any way encourage/force someone like Kenny Williams to draft for talent and not necessarily signability? It seems like it would but maybe I'm misreading it. Any thoughts?

Yes and no. Signability in the "will this guy want too much money" sense is largely off the table in early rounds anyway. Signability remains a factor for guys with college commitments, as it always will, but the leverage that commitment creates is wildly reduced.

Instead of the onus being on teams to buy players out of college, it shifts to being more on the player to decide whether to enter pro ball immediately or not.

There could be an emphasis on drafting higher ceiling high school talent sooner in order to make sure you're drafting them in spots where you can give them the money it takes to sign without incurring penalties, with an accompanying inefficiency with regards to the "safer" college seniors. So the system could encourage teams to take more risks, betting on tools.

But deeper into the draft you could see teams drifting toward safer picks, and moving away from the idea of drafting on talent. Under the old system, guys with talent who were seen as firm in their college commitment would fall until a team was willing to take a chance on money-whipping him.

I think this probably helps the Sox- they've been full of talk about drafting aggressively in recent years but have never put in the resources it takes to actually do it. Now that everyone is forced to play by the Sox self-imposed rules, they should have better access to talent. Maybe even start going after high school talent finally.